One point in particular just now worried him.  Thus, as fish, eggs, porridge, hot cakes, honey, and jam disappeared in succession, he opened himself to Damaris and Carteret.  A difficult subject, namely that of a second opinion.—­Let no thought of any wounding of his susceptibilities operate against the calling in of such.  He was ready and willing to meet any fellow practitioner they might select—­a Harley Street big-wig, or Dr. Maskall, of Harchester, whose advice in respect of cardiac trouble was wide sought.

He had, however, but just launched the question when Hordle entered and, walking to the head of the table, addressed Damaris.

“Sir Charles desires me to say he will be glad to see you, miss, when you are at liberty,” he told her in muffled accents.

She sprang up, to pause an instant, irresolute, glancing wide-eyed at Carteret.

He had risen too.  Coming round the corner of the table, he drew back her chair, put his hand under her elbow, went with her to the door.

“There is nothing to dread, dearest witch,” he gently and quietly said.  “Have confidence in yourself.  God keep you—­and him.—­Now you are quite ready?  That’s right.—­Well, then go.”

Carteret waited, looking after her until, crossing the hall followed by Hordle, she passed along the corridor out of sight.  Silent, preoccupied, he closed the door and took a turn the length of the room before resuming his place at the opposite side of the table to McCabe, facing the light.

The doctor, who had ceased eating and half risen to his feet at the commencement of this little scene, watched it throughout; at first indifferent, a prey to his own worries, but soon in quickening interest, shrewd enquiry and finally in dawning comprehension.

“Holy Mother of Mercy, so that’s the lay of the land, is it?” and his loose lips shaped themselves to a whistle, yet emitted no sound.  To obliterate all signs of which tendency to vulgar expression of enlightenment he rubbed moustache, mouth and chin with his napkin, studying Carteret closely meanwhile.

“In the pink of condition, by Gad—­good for a liberal twenty years yet, and more—­bar accident.  Indefinite postponement of the grand climacteric in this case.—­All the same a leetle, lee-tie bit dangerous, I’m thinking, for both, if she tumbles to it.”

Then aloud—­“Has the poor darling girl grasped the meaning of her father’s illness do you make out, Colonel grasped the ugly eventualities of it?”

Carteret slowly brought his glance to bear on the speaker.

“I believe so, though she has not actually told me as much,” he said—­“And now about this question of a second opinion, McCabe?”

The easily huffed Irishman accepted the reproof in the best spirit possible, as confirming his own perspicacity.

“Quite so.  Flicked him neatly on the raw, and he winced.  All the same he’s a white man, a real jewel of a fellow, worthy of good fortune if the ball’s thrown his way.  I wonder how long, by-the-by, this handsome game’s been a-playing?”